


The Witch's Boy

by theangelhastheimpala



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Magic, Dark, Dubious Consent, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-07
Updated: 2014-03-07
Packaged: 2018-01-14 23:22:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1282507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theangelhastheimpala/pseuds/theangelhastheimpala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a vial of Sam’s blood on a leather cord around Ruby's neck, tying him to her. When he is kissing her, his fingers tangle in it and he remembers the night two years ago she drew his blood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Witch's Boy

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know what happened here... But it happened. So enjoy, I guess?

There is a vial of Sam’s blood on a leather cord around the witch’s neck, tying him to her. When he is kissing her, his fingers tangle in it and he remembers the night two years ago she drew his blood, remembers the smell of burning sage and the slice of the silver knife across his throat. Remembers the moment he stopped breathing, the moment Ruby drew his spirit back into his body with the blood-link.

“Sammy,” Ruby whispers. Her words are honey-sweet. He tastes them as Ruby presses her lips to his. “Sam, look at me.” He is drawn back to her. He avoids the cord as he kisses his way down her neck. He is restless, but he pours himself into the debauchery of skin.

He sees Dean in his mind’s eye as his concentration slips, as he presses a kiss to the witch’s collarbone, just below where the vial rests. Dean is dozing peacefully by the fire in their father’s cabin. He is healthy and whole, not shaking with a body-wracking cough. It was worth it.

Magic, Ruby claims, is not a force of creation. It is a series of tradeoffs, of equal barter. An eye for an eye, a life for a life. Sam wants to believe Ruby is good. He does not want to know what she traded for her power.

She blew into town on a cold wind heaven-knows-how-many years ago, settled in a small cabin on the edge of the woods. The boards of the floor are fire-warm under Sam’s feet, but his heart lies in his chest cold and heavy as a stone.

“Stay in tonight,” Ruby says as they lie together, spent.

“But you’re going out,” Sam says. “You said that you needed the foxglove for tonight. I wanted to see Dean while you had no need of me.”

“I need you here,” Ruby says. She reaches up and grasps Sam’s face. She turns it so he has no choice but to look into the coal of her eyes. Her touch makes something flip inside his stomach. It is not that he does not love her; it is that he wonders if he ever had a choice.

“Do not leave the house tonight,” she says, “come what may.”

She rises and dresses, throwing a heavy cloak around her shoulders.

“Ruby?” Sam says. Her name feels heavy on his tongue. They are not equals, and yet they address one another as such.

“Yes, love?”

“Be safe.” He does not know if the warning is for her, or for everyone else.

“You as well.” She sets the blood-link on the mantelpiece. It will tie him to the house. If he goes too far, his spirit will begin to pull from his bones.  
Sam waits until he can no longer hear the padding of her bare feet on the stone path outside, then three dozen breaths more. He goes to the mantle and slips the necklace around his neck. He has to go. He knows that he’s spent too long with Ruby, that he can’t remember who he was before her. It’s time.

Sam fetches a lantern and slips out the door, shivering in the cool fall air. He treads lightly as he walks across the village, tries to avoid being seen. It is not wise to anger Ruby. When he reaches his father’s cabin, Dean greets him at the door.

“Sammy?” he says.

“Dean!” And then they are in each other’s arms, clasping on for dear life.

“You can’t come see me every now and then?” Dean lets him go slowly. “It’s been how long?”

“Ruby and I come all the time.”

“Yeah, you and Ruby.” Dean glowers as he speaks the witch’s name, as if somehow he could defy her even in her absence.

“She’s not all bad. She saved your life”

“Yeah? At what cost? Yours?”

“I’m here now. Look.” He elbows Dean, as if to prove he is solid. Dean’s face doesn’t change.

“I didn’t ask for your life. I don’t deserve that.”

“A life for a life,” Sam says. “It’s only fair. You didn’t deserve to die. I…I couldn’t lose you.”

“But you did,” Dean said. “You’re not even the same person. You’re…you’re too much like her.”

He turns his back to Sam, and for a moment Sam thinks his brother is angry, but Dean is just putting a kettle on the fire. As they drink the rhubarb tea, Dean tells him about how his father is still gone, chasing the beast that killed their mother. About the black yearling in the barn stall, about the crops he grew himself this year, about the blue-eyed man whose eyes Dean often catches following him. Sam knows nothing but Ruby any more. He has nothing to say.  
The wind whistles outside, and Dean looks cautiously at the door. “You shouldn’t have come tonight. You’ll have to walk home with the dead.”

“I know.”

The dead walk through the streets on All Hallows’ Eve. Ruby works dark magic while the veil is thin. And Sam stays safe inside, where he cannot be pulled away from his body. Until tonight. If he listens closely, he can hear his mother’s voice on the wind.

“I’ll be fine. Ruby’ll have my hide more than any ghost if she catches me gone.” He forces a smile.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” Dean doesn’t even try to hide the tears glistening in his eyes.

“I have to. There’s nothing left of me.”

“Don’t leave me.”

“You said it earlier,” Sam says. “I already did.”

Then Dean’s arms are around him. “Say hi to mom for me. I’ll see you next year, right? You'll be with the dead?”

“I’ll be with them.”

“You’d better be.” So much is unsaid, but Sam knows.

He throws the vial on the ground as he leaves the house. There is nothing to hold his spirit to earth, nothing to keep it from leaving his skin.

“Mom?”

His mother is standing in front of him, ethereal in a gown of white.

“It’s okay, Sammy. Come home.”

Tomorrow they will find his body on the ground. Tonight, he is pulling apart at the seams. He should be with the dead. He's been dead for three years now. Mary reaches out her hand and smiles. Sam blows out his lantern and joins her.


End file.
